Last Fort Worth band member sentenced for selling counterfeit guitars

The last Fort Worth defendant charged in a scheme to sell counterfeit guitars to Pennsylvania pawnshops was sentenced Thursday to one day in federal jail and more than $7,000 in restitution.

Randy Gray, 27, was also sentenced to three years of supervision, according to federal officials in Philadelphia, where he was sentenced.

Gray was part of the Josh Davis Band and was one of four men charged in the case, each of whom pleaded guilty, officials said.

The counterfeit guitars carried the marks of C.F. Martin and Co. Guitars, Guild Guitars Inc. and Gibson Guitar Corp., according to federal documents. Federal agents said the counterfeit goods were largely indistinguishable from the real thing.

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A total of 165 counterfeit guitars were sold to pawnshops nationwide from 2008 to 2011 for about $56,000, according to the documents. Pawnshop locations included Texas, Florida, California and Alabama, Assistant U.S. Attorney John Gallagher said Thursday.

“About 90 percent of the counterfeits were Martins,” Gallagher said. “This was done as they toured the country.”

Federal agents were tipped off last year when a pawnshop in Tallahassee, Fla., told local police that it had been conned.

The case was prosecuted in Pennsylvania because Martin’s headquarters are in Nazareth, Pa.

Gray’s co-defendants were Bruce Alford, 41, of Fort Worth; Romeo Rondeau, 44, of Fort Worth; and Josh Davis, 39, of Galveston. In November, Rondeau was ordered to pay $7,133.93 in restitution and serve six months of home confinement.

In December, a judge ordered Alford to pay more than $8,800 in restitution. Davis was ordered in January to pay $22,047 in restitution and serve six months of home confinement.